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jmercury's review
5.0
I originally got this book to read more about Shakuntula Devi, the great Indian calculator, but found myself quickly engrossed in the volume. Smith has a writing style which maintains objectivity while incorporating emotive prose, humor, and thoughtfulness.
The first few sections of the book are essentially a literature review of first hand accounts of calculators. The emphasis is on attempts to quantify aspects of the ability such as speed and size of calculations. It also discusses techniques used to perform mental calculations, and speculates on why and how some people develop incredible mental calculating ability. I appreciated that even in a book of this age, Smith accedes that women calculators are more rare for social rather than biological reasons. Noting this relatively early in the book made me put more trust in Smith's judgment in the biographical sections.
The biographical sections make up the last half of the book. Each chapter therein is dedicated to a single calculator for whom sufficient information is known. (Calculators with overwhelming fame or vanishing traces are briefly summarized in a final biographical chapter.) The biographies capture images of what seems to be a full spectrum of humanity. The great mental calculators were of all races, they were poor and they were rich, they were of intelligent and caring parents, they were from abusive homes, they died wealthy and famous or destitute and nearly unknown... Each story is fascinating in its own right.
In the end, I was disappointed by an exceptionally brief chapter on Ms. Devi, but forgive the book this flaw for its informative and entertaining nature!
The first few sections of the book are essentially a literature review of first hand accounts of calculators. The emphasis is on attempts to quantify aspects of the ability such as speed and size of calculations. It also discusses techniques used to perform mental calculations, and speculates on why and how some people develop incredible mental calculating ability. I appreciated that even in a book of this age, Smith accedes that women calculators are more rare for social rather than biological reasons. Noting this relatively early in the book made me put more trust in Smith's judgment in the biographical sections.
The biographical sections make up the last half of the book. Each chapter therein is dedicated to a single calculator for whom sufficient information is known. (Calculators with overwhelming fame or vanishing traces are briefly summarized in a final biographical chapter.) The biographies capture images of what seems to be a full spectrum of humanity. The great mental calculators were of all races, they were poor and they were rich, they were of intelligent and caring parents, they were from abusive homes, they died wealthy and famous or destitute and nearly unknown... Each story is fascinating in its own right.
In the end, I was disappointed by an exceptionally brief chapter on Ms. Devi, but forgive the book this flaw for its informative and entertaining nature!
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